Thursday, May 5, 2011

Over the recent years, Dubai has become a centre of attraction for tourists from around the world. Since very long, the Dubai Duty Free Shop has been attracting tourists to shop from the large variety of items stuffed on its shelves. But recently, the Dubai rulers have expanded Dubai in all dimensions to provide a multi-dimensional cheap and affordable tourist site for those who want their holidays spent in oriental style.

Located south of the Persian Gulf on the Arabian Peninsula, Dubai is a thriving and lively of almost all the other smaller states of the region. Not restricted to tourism, it has also become a major business hub, dealing in real estate and financial services. Due to its intensive emphasis on tourists and businessmen, Dubai was ranked as the 8th most visited city of the world in 2007. And that is what attracted me to Dubai to find out more about Dubai in 2009.

Dubai is crowded with world class malls and shopping centres. Dubai Shopping Mall, overlooked by the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building of the world rising up to height of 828 metres, is classified as the biggest (or perhaps one of the biggest) malls of the world. One is almost lost once inside the mall for it has matchless attractions both within and without. A friend suggested me to watch the fountain. Now he did not mention about the music fountain that is outside the mall. So while I was inside the mall, I came across a huge waterfall which was both innovative and amazing. I and my wife took it for the fountain we had been referred too and enjoyed watching the water falling from almost 60-80 feet above. I shot a brief movie of the fall from my digital camera as shown below.

When we came back and told our friend of having seen the “fountain”, he was dismayed and came over to our hotel and took us back to Dubai Mall once again. Since it was almost 8 in the evening, the peak rush hour, it took us some half an hour to find a parking in its multi-storied parking lot. And the he took us out of the Dubai Mall where there was huge water reservoir. We were told that it was coming direct from the sea. It was quite dark outside, may be planned that way for the best observation of the water fountain.

We had hardly stood there for a while, when suddenly loud music started playing and from the reservoir, a huge fountain erupted, lit by lights from varying angles. And for next 8-10 minutes, I along with my wife, and am sure all the visitors standing around, too were amazed, dazed and completely engrossed in watching the biggest music fountain of the world.

I don’t have to explain how fabulous it looked – just watch the video above that I made with my Sony DSC H2 digital camera. All I can say is that if you happen to be visiting Dubai next time, don’t miss to watch the Music Fountain, lest you slip a lifetime opportunity, that we almost did.